


Of memories and whatever remains

by Bonemarroww



Series: Of trust and deadly lights [2]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Depiction of wounds and scars, Desire of revenge, First Order, Kylo Ren Has Issues, Years Later
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-08
Updated: 2019-03-28
Packaged: 2019-09-14 07:06:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 14,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16908405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bonemarroww/pseuds/Bonemarroww
Summary: “That’s gonna leave some nasty scars, y’know.”Years have passed since the incident that earned her these heavy scars and the infamous nickname, but One-Ear never forgot. As much as her new life satisfies her, an underlying desire burns in her heart ; to find the man who killed her young self, and to kill him in return.In her wanderings, she comes to meet a man in a metal mask; but how come she feels so familiar to him?





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This work is the second part of my fiction "Of trust and deadly lights", which I advise you to read first.  
> I hope you will like it!

_“Damn, kid. You have more balls than I gave you credit for. What a shame it’s still not enough to go through with it.”_

_The girl’s furious eye darted from her reflection in the mirror to the man behind her. Baron, he called himself. Some bootlegger she owed her life to –or so he had said. Leaning on the bathroom’s door frame, the man observed her with a slight smirk, a small scar at the corner of his mouth making him look incredibly cocky._

_“Fuck off.”_

_She hated how muffled her voice was sounding._

_After a second without him commenting her every thought, she dared to look at the mirror again. She wondered what would happen when she would take the bandages off. It had been almost a week since she had made that fateful, admittedly stupid choice to follow. Follow. Oh, how she hated that word. It seemed she had spent her entire life her eyes closed, following the Sacred Pull, being tossed around by whatever the Force wanted her to do, wanted her to be. And she followed. Followed. Followed._

_“That’s gonna leave some nasty scars, y’know.”_

_The young girl balled her fists in answer to Baron’s light tone, unafraid to draw blood from her palms. It’s not like it would matter, anyway._

_“I had figured as much, thank you.” She bit back, teeth clenched uncomfortably._

_The light pressure of the sterile dressing against her wounds was a slight discomfort, and but quite relieving as well. A part of her couldn’t wait to rip it off her face; the other was scared of falling apart if she did. If the painkillers did their work nicely, it certainly felt like the bandages were the only things keeping her together, and that she would fall into a million pieces as soon as they were off her._

_She wished Baron would leave her alone. Ever since her breakdown, he had been the shadow of her every step. Didn’t he have other things to do, doing whatever smuggler did when they were on autopilot?_

_“Come on, kid. I thought you’d have the balls to do it. I’m quite disappointed, so far.”_

_His words left her boiling in anger, and with a new determination, she messily took the white bandages off, ripped the bloodied compresses from her wounds, and breathlessly looked straight in front of her._

_In the mirror was sitting a crying girl, her erratic breathing making her shoulders tremble as if in fear. Her left cheek was severely burnt; what was left of her skin coloured in a bright red. A burnt hole was torn from just behind her lips, nearly reaching her cheekbone, letting her white teeth and jawbone visible from a certain angle. The burn mark was then turning off to the side of her face. Where was once her ear now was only a small, pointy-shaped remain of her outer ear, surrounded by shaven hair._

_“Damn, girl, you look positively gruesome!” Baron laughed, his hands coming to clasp her trembling shoulders, a crazed look in his eyes._

_Her eyes fixed on the poor girl’s, and she couldn’t find any smart comeback to spit at him; only tears to run down on her cheek and flow in her mouth, the salty taste making her wince._

_“But you know what, kid?” the man leaned down to whisper in what was left of her ear, his breath light and warm to her skin. “I like gruesome.”_


	2. Chapter 1

Breathing hard in his mask, Kylo Ren sat in his sanctuary. A small room adjacent to his bedroom, furnished with nothing but a small round table and a stool. Somehow, the narrowness of the room seemed to appease the raging fire burning through him, as if it helped to ground his mind to this single place.

In this sanctuary, two somewhat contradictory artefacts were disposed on the table.

One was an old, broken, dusty mask. It was his pull to the darkness, the comforting reminder of his heritage; what conquered his heart in times of doubt. When he talked to this skull of a mask, when he opened what was left of his soul and allowed himself to feel the dark Force surrounding it, he felt like he belonged.

The other, rather curiously, was a lightsaber. A pretty thing, all smooth and silver-like metal, the handle decorated with a  familiar little pattern. She had engraved it, long years ago. And just like her touch had always appeased him, taking it in his palms usually placed a peaceful veil of agreeable memories at the back of his mind. On occasion, he would ignite it, and dance with the mauve blade, wielding it as carefully as one would hold a piece of crystal. In these moments, the image of Luke Skywalker bringing back a grey-skinned, veiled body faded from his mind. The terrible voice of his former master, which haunted his nights; the dreadful words left his memory, if only for a moment.

_“She is gone, Ben.”_

The Jedi Master had never looked at him the same way after that. If Ben Solo had been too busy mourning his friend to notice, the dark part at the back of his brain had seen it all. The distrustful looks, the hesitation.

Oh, how he had deserved these looks.

Sometimes, Kylo wondered what  she would have thought of him if she were still alive. In these days, Supreme Leader Snoke would usually blame him for holding on to her memory so much. She had undoubtedly been the barrier that had prevented Snoke from taking control for so long; maybe he was scared She would find a way, somehow, to bring the light back in his heart. Never would Ben have joined the First Order, had she not perished, after all.

An annoying beeping sound shook him from his thoughts. In his living room, his holopad was emitting a regular tone, signalling an incoming message.

With a heavy sigh, the knight of Ren left his sanctuary and opened the hologram he had received from Captain Phasma. Apparently, he was to interrogate a man his troopers had arrested a few days before; a possible arm dealer who had been arrested with a few blasters of surprisingly high quality. Snoke had been interested –of course he had. The First Order needed the best, and if this puny trafficker had access to such weapons, maybe it was of the First Order’s interest to investigate where they came from.

Interrogating suspects nearly always fell on Kylo; though, sometimes, Phasma would relieve him of some low cases. His talent as a thought invader made him an ideal… confessor.

As usual, when he arrived to the interrogation cell, Phasma was waiting for him. As soon as he nodded at her, signalling her he was taking the helm, she left without a word or a look, and he entered the room. The walls here were particularly thick; and should the interrogation get ugly, no one would know.

The frightened man bound to the chair already looked as if he was about to cry. He was thin, dark-skinned, and genuinely seemed not to know why he was thus held prisoner. Arm dealerships weren’t exactly forbidden in this area of the galaxy; if the First Order controlled a few vessels from time to time, it was purely to target the Resistance. Locals, neutral individuals and colonies supporting them were left quite free to roam armed in the galaxy. After all, in a world were some planets were extremely dangerous from their fauna, a few blasters weren’t considered heavy weaponry.

“Whom were you delivering those blasters to?” his mechanic voice boomed in the silence of the room.

All colour drained from the prisoner’s face.

“An arm dealership on my planet! Gundarks’ hunting season is approaching, best time in the year to sell light weaponry.”

Disbelieving, Kylo put his hand on the man’s forehead, and forcefully immersed himself in the man’s memories, ripping a scream for the prisoner’s throat. There, he saw a planet with a red soil; three moons, dark forests and dark red creatures lurking in caves.

No trace of the Resistance, or any suspicious clients, for that matter.

A few tears fell from the poor soul’s eyes, as Kylo retreated to his own mind.

“Who is your supplier?”

At this question, the dark-skinned man adverted his eyes, grimacing.

“I-I shouldn’t tell you…”

In a quick move, Kylo drew his lightsaber from his hip and pointed it at the man’s neck, deadly light threatening to burn him.

“You very much should, if you value your insignificant life. Speak.”

For a second and a half, it looked like the prisoner was about to faint. Maybe the lightsaber was a bit much. In retrospect, he should have known there was no way this peasant could be from the Resistance. No serious organisation would hire such a scaredy cat.

“I buy these from a smuggler based in the Mid Rim, Dustig sector! Big man, lots of clients, very private.”

Kylo lowered his weapon, seeing as his prey looked just scared enough to offload everything the First Order needed to know.

“Name. Physical Appearance. Don’t make me look in your head myself.”

Frightened, the prisoner nodded frantically.

“Baron! He calls himself Baron. I have never met him, but I am acquainted with his Lieutenant. A woman, my age, short hair, scars on half of her face. I don’t know her name, she goes by her title… or –or One-Ear, on a good day.”

Kylo tilted his head. What kind of ugly name was this?

“One-Ear?”

“Yes, yes, as in one - ear. She took a blaster shot to the head a few years ago –a transaction gone wrong, I don’t know the details. Wiped off her left ear, part of her face. She kept the nickname.”

Curious, but not unheard of, when it came to nicknames among bootleggers. The woman was probably using her marred face to play tough; couldn’t blame her there.

“When are you meeting her again?”

 

 

“This leather is pretty, isn’t it?”

One-Ear held the fabric out for her partner to see. The leather was cut from a Southern creature of the Inner Rim; quite exotic. Its dark red colour shined black, under the right light. Very resistant, too –this would make a fine sum of credits, when sold to the good bidder. And Whatever Entity Up There knew Baron had a fine taste in matter of bidders.

The older man hummed in appreciation, examining the product of their latest trade, before smirking at the scarred woman. This same smirk always brought a similar one to her lips –as much as one could manage in absence of half their cheek muscles. Baron was so much more than any smuggler –he was a real businessman; it had not taken her more than a few weeks by his side to learn this, and One-Ear admired him a great lot for it.

“It is. You make a fine trade lady, Lil’ Ear.”

This made her lift an eyebrow, a small laugh at the back of her throat, as she leaned closer to his face, narrowing her eyes.

“Because I’m a lady, now? You amuse me.”

Withdrawing before her friend could react, she pretended to be highly interested by the leather, slowing tracing patterns on it with the pad of her fingers. With a coy look, she brought it to her face, hiding her scars to his acute gaze.

“Maybe I should craft a mask out of these… Since, you know, I’m so undesirable…” she teased.

Baron groaned and discarded the leather, before grabbing her wrist and letting himself fall down on a nearby crate of merchandise, successfully making her fall against him, her crotch conveniently rubbing against his.

“Come here, Lil’ Ear, and I’ll show you just how undesirable you are…” his drawl took a husky tone as One-Ear let out a giddy laugh. “Because whoever said that has never looked at you in the eyes… or had an eye for your tits…”

The younger woman playfully smacked the back of his head, but her smile betrayed her.

“Then show me how wrong they are, _Baronet_.”

 

 

“Just so you know, she isn’t faint-hearted. I mean; she bites.”

Kylo shrugged as he sat, his arms crossed, on a crate full of Gundark claws, teeth and fur. He had decided to meet this smuggler woman if it meant he could get in contact somehow with this Baron. He had, for this purpose, brought the timid man back to his planet to collect whatever he needed for the transaction and then followed him to the meeting place.

His unintentional informer had explained to him how things worked with Baron and his Lieutenant: a meeting place he was informed of in the days before the date, where he would bring the products and credits –their supplier demanded a payment half in credits, half in nature. Lieutenant would then come with the freight and make the exchange. They would remain here the time needed to full the ships, eventually negotiate the next exchange, and then they would be gone. In and out.

It seemed, however, that a problem had arisen this time.

Maybe the smuggler had seen or sensed another presence with her usual client, seeing as, half an hour past the meeting time, Lieutenant was still absent, and with every minutes passing, Kylo was a bit more tempted to choke the man beside him; if only to shut him up. The skinny guy just couldn’t help making nervous comments about the coming transactions.

When, finally, a medium sized ship, grey and unrecognizable, landed next to theirs, Kylo felt a strange shiver take over him; like something was off, like he didn’t know something he should.

However, he put this nagging feeling on the back of his mind as a lean figure walked down to the ground, hands in the pockets of her grey leather jacket.

“I didn’t know you were coming with a friend this time.” She hailed the black-skinned man, who smiled nervously in return.

The Commander of the First Order made the most of this moment by taking in the traits of the strange woman facing him; a bit shocked, if he could admit it to himself. Her hair was cut very short, but a whole part of her head, near an almost non-existent left ear, was made bald from what appeared to be serious burn marks. In the same manner, the left side of her face was heavily scarred, her left cheek nearly entirely gone; but what struck him the most was without a doubt the proud look she was harbouring, this brazenness in her eyes… Like she couldn’t care less.

Kylo hadn’t thought her wounds would be so bad; but now that he was studying the devastated face in front of him, something bothered him.

“Blaster shots don’t leave these kind of scars… _One-Ear_.” He warily stated.

The man beside him flinched. Baron’s Lieutenant turned to look at Kylo, an unimpressed look in her attitude, as she came closer to him, until being almost face to face with his mask; her arms crossed in the same way his were.

“Kylo Ren, Commander of the First Order, Leader of the Knights of Ren… And a nosy bitch on top of that? Quite the long list already, for a dude playing dress-up in a shiny mask. You should give up one or two; unless you want ‘sore eunuch’ to be added to them.”

 _She bites_. The calm fury in her eyes convinced Kylo to just drop it for the time being. At his lack of answer, a satisfied smirk lifted the right corner of her lips.

“There, that’s better.”

Her condescending tone infuriated the Commander of the First Order, and an irresistible want to crush her insignificant little throat with the Force took him; but rather surprisingly, something simmering within him prevented him from even drawing his lightsaber. There was definitely something wrong with the woman. As she blatantly ignored him, preferring to exchange some insignificant news with the thin man at his side, Kylo meditated over intruding her head right now or doing it more formally in an interrogation cell. It’s not like he could not take down her ship, and force her to lead him to Baron some way or another.

Ultimately, a reasonable part of him –or what was left of it– reminded him that she hadn’t done anything worthy of an interrogation besides being a bratty bitch. He could read her thoughts now. She wasn’t paying attention. Not that it would matter if she were. If only to know why she was thus late, he would invade her thoughts.

Turns out, slipping into her mind –incredibly easily– led him to a rather steamy sexual encounter in a cargo deck at the forefront of her mind, followed, as he flipped through her thoughts as pages through a book, by many other similar moments in exotic places. Kylo quickly pulled out, admittedly a bit flushed and very thankful for his mask. When someone had such thoughts and… _private encounters_ in mind, the decency would have it they entertained a few mind barriers. It was only natural for one to protect their thoughts, wasn’t it? Was this one-eared Lieutenant conscious that one could slip in her mind like you could bathe in a transparent lake, without any shadow to hide any secrets?

One thing was sure, though, he wouldn’t enter her head again. Definitely too dirty.

“Anyway, what is sweet commander’s business here?” Lieutenant designated Kylo, her fists on her hips and her head tilted to the side, exposing her scars.

Gritting his teeth and willing himself not to choke her at this very instant, the Commander answered.

“The First Order is interested in your weapons.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, One-Ear has a lover that is not Kylo... and I'm not sorry about that, honestly I love Baron (Even though he's in the background. I like background characters.).
> 
> Their relationship isn't gonna be that important in the story though, considering this is all about One-Ear and Kylo. 
> 
> Thank you for reading, I'll see you next time.


	3. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can't imagine how much of a mess my draft is. I didn't write my scenes in the chronological order and it's bloody complicated to get a timeline out of it haha !  
> Anyway, happy new year everyone !

A routine was quickly established between Baron’s Lieutenant and the First Order’s Commander. She wouldn’t deliver too many weapons at once; first, because of the possibility of Resistance sympathisers intercepting her; as they sure wouldn’t like too much her selling weapons to the enemy. Secondly, it took time to assemble them; without the weapons being of their entire craftsmanship, Baron and One-Ear had their trade secrets.

Soon, Kylo and Lieutenant reached an accord that they would meet twice a month. When usually, the First Order would send an agent to retrieve the freight, Kylo insisted on being the one to make the transactions. You could not simply entrust just any sub officer with such a sum as the price of the weapons; and who knows what could happen to the freight if the man just decided to desert the First Order and sell them for his private benefit?

No, Kylo could and would take care of it himself.

No matter how irritating the smuggler lady was.

“What kind of metal is your mask made of?” she asked him on their third commercial encounter, as she was casually counting the crates of blasters, to check if everything was in order. “A little birdie tells me it’s expensive. Do you have any spares?”

The way she licked her lips while eyeing him made Kylo positively red in anger. He was no piece of meat to be thus evaluated and priced. However, he had long accepted that there wasn’t much he could to for her to quit being such a… well; he wouldn’t think the end of this sentence.

“Why do I get the feeling that I shouldn’t turn my back to you?” he grumbled, rolling his eyes and kicking the nearest crate to make her hurry up.

A low chuckle escaped her lips, and she shook her head.

“You better don’t. I’d sell you for 2 000 credits, if you can take that as an answer. But I’d sell the mask separately. You never know how much you can get for it at a local auction.”

Kylo huffed and looked away. What was there even to answer to that?

“I don’t know why I bother with you.” He truthfully stated.

With a smirk he was starting to get used to, One-Ear dropped her holopad on the nearest crate and slowly approached him. Slowly and carefully; as if walking around a wild animal that she knew could lash out any moment. A hand came to find his shoulder; in a soft manner the man would have called hesitation had he not known her better. The other one slid on his waist, as she ever so leisurely flushed herself against him, her eyes almost coming level with his.

She took her time to answer to him, her eyes mocking innocence as her hand on his shoulder came to rest on his neck.

“You do so, Mr. Commander, because… though you are scared to admit it…”

With a light push, she brought his head closer to hers, and in the same move placed a long kiss on the front part of his mask.

“… you like the company.”

As if suddenly waking up, Kylo shoved her aside, earning a chuckle from the wicked woman. At the sight of his stiff and angry demeanor, she licked her lips again; and when he dared look at her in what she guessed was a killing glare, she smiled.

“Oh, I do like this mask very much.”

 

 

“Too slow!”

The fake lightsaber hit the trainee right in the ribs.

“Too predictable!”

The blade stopped the younger man’s dead in its tracks, before shaking it out of his opponent’s hands and knocking him down in one single move.

Despite his having the upper hand and managing to make his disciple bite the dust, Kylo’s breathing was ragged and loud. Training in his complete attire was obviously not his smartest move; but Supreme Leader Snoke had ordered him to train more, both physically and mentally. Doing a series of fights under the weight of his mask and combat gear was probably an excellent exercise, as uncomfortable as it was.

One doesn’t attack a Resistance base being bare-chested, after all. What was even the logic of training in comfortable clothes? The battlefield is never comfortable; the deathly chessboard of war wouldn’t be soft on its pawns. Surely the Supreme Leader would be satisfied of his rational thinking.

Out of breath and content with the session of training he had just made, the master of the Knights of Ren decided to call it a day. His clothes were starting to feel too warm, too tight, sweaty from all the exertion he had just done. As he made his way from the training grounds, he pretended not to hear the younger men’s relief at finally being able to leave and –most probably– take a turn by the medical bay to treat their bruises. Kylo had been in a good mood this day; and whoever knew the Commander the slightest bit knew how much of a walking danger he was when content with himself. If the Jedi Killer tended to be deadlier when angry, a cocky Kylo Ren was hardly better, and one would be a fool to ignore this.

At the moment he was crossing the threshold of the door, a sudden nagging feeling birthed at the back of his head; and so he quickly turned back to look at the training ground, only to have his heart freeze and his blood whistle at his ears.

Standing in the very center of the fighting ring was a young girl, not seventeen, with long braided hair and innocent pale eyes; her lips in a straight line and her hand gripping the handle an all-too familiar lightsaber.

Kylo stiffly stood there for what felt like an eternity in stasis, her name on his lips, before the automatic door closed, hiding her from his gaze.

When he opened the door again, frantically shoving it aside as soon as it started opening, she was gone.

Later on that evening, secluded in his sanctuary, the man who was once a Jedi willed the Force to bring her ghost back to him. He could still remember, when he was younger, his uncle Luke –the bastard– telling him about the force ghosts, appearing sometimes to guide the living. For hours he stood there awaiting her image to appear, if only behind his eyelids; but time had gotten the better of his memory. With the horrors he had seen and done, he could scarcely recall her traits anymore.

 

 

Despite his original vow never to enter her head again, Kylo eventually found himself diving in the lake that was her mind during their encounters. More often than not, the snarky young woman would remind him of her antipathy for him, all teasing and bare fangs. Not that she was purposefully mean –the Commander soon learnt that it was simply her way of being. More than once he heard her rant haughtily without really caring whether he listened or not. One-Ear thought highly of her opinions –which were also Baron’s, he could wager–, and always made a point to teach him one thing or another. Kylo wasn’t sure what was her biggest fault in his eyes; this patronizing facet of hers, the overly confident way she stood, or the way her eyes squinted and lips perked up when she casually made fun of him.

It felt like her entire being was radiating a burning, biting energy she directed at him.

Something was definitely wrong with her. There was all of her teasing, but also the wary looks she gave him when she thought he was not looking. In these moments, her face was losing its snarky mask, a strange seriousness in her air. Like she knew something. Yes, she knew him more than he knew her, and that was driving him mad.

The Sith knew he had never seen her before –he would have recognized such a face. Where was this familiarity coming from then?

Tirelessly, when the time came for Lieutenant to check the transfer of credits from the First Order to her personal wallet, Kylo would sink in her mind and look for answers. Any sign that may indicate why this mistrustful look when she otherwise seemed to be a carefree person.

Once again, Kylo was pulled from her mind and his deep thoughts when the woman hawked indiscreetly, her eyes boring into his soul.

“Having fun up there?” she smirked, her hand coming to tap her temple repeatedly.

Vexed to have been caught on the act, the Commander only groaned.

“Not quite. Entering your mind feels like the easiest thing in the world; finding something else than your affairs is another thing entirely.”

A chuckle escaped Lieutenant’s lips, as she leant her tilted her head towards him.

“Maybe what you’re looking for no longer exists. Do you want me to tell you a secret?” she didn’t wait for his answer. “You can never erase memories. But you can drown them. Make so many others. Cherish them, rather than the old. And, given time, it will eventually fade. First, the names, and then the faces. The voices, the feelings, the intentions. All of this will be gone in a blur of colours and smells.”

A flicker of amusement in her eyes, she withdraw from him, taking a few steps back to grab her holopad and check if the credits from the First Order had been received yet.

“When I’ll be old and you’ll be long gone, Ren, fallen from your pointless, endless wars, you too will have joined this cemetery of moments. No face… No voice… Not even a real name. No feelings. No empathy. You have nothing I could not forget like the rest. But if you want to see something really odd…”

Pretending to check if no one was listening, One-Ear leaned towards him and whispered.

“There is one thing I can still picture… clear as day… when all the rest is gone. Look for the past, but further than that, look for what is clear in the dark and the blurry.”

 

 

_“I was thinking, the other day… Do you still do the mind thing?” her lover asked as he joined her under the sheets and enlaced her from behind._

_His hands came to stroke her warm skin; and Lieutenant turned in his arms to give him a kiss. In the most unladylike way, she made herself comfortable against his chest, her breathing slow. Her eyes closed, she appeared deep in thoughts, as if looking for words, or maybe memories._

_“No… This part of me is long gone, I’m afraid.” She quietly whispered. “This day, when we met… When I woke up in the emergency treatment unit… It was everywhere.”_

_Baron listened in silence, lightly kissing her forehead, to encourage her to go on._

_“It was surrounding me, to the point where I could barely breath. It had never been this strong before.”_

_Her fingers went to thread with his own, gently seeking his warmth._

_“The grey lady was there.”_

_“The princess?”_

_One-Ear nodded slowly, opening her eyes without looking at any point precisely._

_“She talked to me, but I couldn’t hear. It was too much, too… stifling. Oppressive. I was afraid. Of being alive, after what happened. So, I screamed to make it all go away. I am dead! I screamed. I am dead, leave me alone! And she did.”_

_His hand slid to rest on her hip, his thumb making small circles on her cool skin._

_“I remember running, but I couldn’t make out where. Everything went black before I could even think of where to go. When I woke up, I was in your ship. And it was gone. All of it. I couldn’t feel anything anymore.”_


	4. Chapter 3

“You’re late.” Kylo commented, once again, as he was sitting on his ship’s access ramp.

Punctuality was not one of Lieutenant’s fortes; though the Commander of the First Order did not dare investigate why she once more made him wait. She always seemed to have extravagant reasons; emergency deliveries, rescue of stranded vessels, mining expeditions on faraway planets… But the man knew better.

“Well, hello to you too.” The woman greeted him with half a smile, and a little square wooden box thrown in his way. “Here, thought you’d like it.”

If it were not for his quick reflexes, the object would have probably hit his chest and fallen off to the snowy ground of the planet they had agreed to meet on. Kylo didn’t hide his wariness of the small box; rarely had he ever been offered gifts. To be offered something by such a volatile person sure was always something to be suspicious of.

“Am I to expect a poison of some sort?” he grumbled, eyeing the little object as if it was about to explode in his hands.

The box was carved from a dark purple wood, venous and dry; like it sucked the humidity from his skin even through his gloves. Its edges were curved and smooth, and it fit perfectly in his palm. On the front side, a tiny golden lock was keeping it closed.

“What is it?” he warily inquired, all the while strangely fascinated by the object.

The bootlegger shrugged, her eyes just as fixed on the box as his were.

“Some Sith relic I found at an antique shop. The key is inside, which is rather comical. Only the darkest of force users can open it. I thought ‘Hey, don’t I know a darkling who might be interested?’ and here you are. Besides, it’s a pretty box. I like it.”

As much as he was curious about what could be inside of it, Kylo knew better than to try to open it in front of her. This could only lead to a disaster, especially if none of them knew what the thing inside was. For all he could imagine, this could very well be a relic draining vital strength from its surroundings.

“I’ll thank you when I know what’s inside of it.”

The dramatically disappointed pout of the woman amused him; he would give her that. For once, she had put aside her usual annoying self and Kylo was one to notice such a feat; giving her present the taste of a peace offering. Maybe she had decided to put whatever grudge she held against him aside and let their partnership take a lighter note of trust and…

“Anyway” she yawned. “It did cost a fortune so you better have brought all the credits I asked, because I ain’t letting you run away so easily.”

Or maybe not.

 

Kylo liked to think that, with time, he and the scarred woman reached some kind of agreement. He wouldn’t call it _trust_ in his wildest dreams; he knew people of her kind. Loyalty wasn’t a word they knew, he was well placed to know this. His father had always been the only one who could make his mother cry; how curious that love can bring such unhappiness.

So, no, the Commander of the First Order wouldn’t say that he trusted One-Ear. No, what they had was more of an implicit understanding; more like they knew the other wouldn’t attempt to shoot through their skull when they turned their back on them. The threat of Baron’s Lieutenant turning her back on him was now not much more than some joke they still pretended to believe in. The First Order’s credits were too easy money for her to deny, and Kylo suspected she was beginning to enjoy his company too. What with her little gift –the existence of which he had nervously hidden from Snoke, having a bad feeling about it– and her constant proximity. Not once had she asked him to remove his helmet, but her hands always seemed to trail on his arms, and mask, and back. Why he let her do so was another thing entirely –of course it was.

Kylo wasn’t going soft on her. He didn’t enjoy her company; he merely tolerated her for the benefit of the First Order. And he definitely didn’t like it when she looked at him with this slight smirk, and this fierce look in her eyes; the look of someone who’s looked at death in the eyes and who now has a lust for living.

_I want to take everything life has to offer and even more; I want to take it all in the roughest manner, ‘cause this is how life takes things from you._ She had said one evening as she stumbled out of her ship, half drunk already.

He sometimes wondered if what he was doing; killing all these men and fighting for Supreme Leader Snoke; was his pragmatic way of “taking things from life” as she so spitefully put it. Kylo could hardly claim to be the happiest man alive, but somehow, he couldn’t picture how would his life be if he hadn’t joined the First Order. Would he have become one of these Resistance scum he so despised?

One thing he was sure of; Meenah would have been just as dead.

This, life had taken and was not giving back.

On the odd occasion when he would dance with her mauve blade, he would think back to the first months following her death and how he had been sure he couldn’t survive any longer. The future had seemed so grey at the time; and before long, grey had turned to black. To the black, he could get used; but one can never get used to the emptiness of a quiet room in the early hours of the morning; when insomnia hits, and one can feel a ghostly warm liquid trickling down one’s hands, staining the sheets drop by drop, until one realises it isn’t real but only some cruel trick of one’s mind.

It was on such an occasion, the skin of his hands raw from having desperately tried to make the blood go away, that he received the message.

_I’m in deep shit._ It said. _Ship’s engine is broken. Need a lift. Orion 13. You’ll see the crater. Bring some iron._

 

Why the Commander would need to rescue his contact from some trouble on Orion 13, of all planets, was beyond him. As far as his knowledge of the Galaxy went, only a couple natives lived on this planet; and all kept their distance from its crater, scared away by a ridiculous belief that demons came there to give birth to their spawns. The entire surface of the planet was covered in forests and lakes, which was quite suitable for survival.

In all likelihood, Lieutenant had pulled a prank on him, sending him on a snipe hunt. For a moment, he had thought of letting her deal with whatever was the problem on her own; but then, the thought of her being in real danger had nagged at his mind. He was surely not the first person she would ask for help in any case of danger; so she either was really desperate or straight up bullshitting him. The second possibility still appeared more likely, considering her request of iron –which he had dealt with by snatching a pre-material regulation hammer from a technician on his way to his ship.

Fortunately for her, what with his sleeplessness, Kylo didn’t really have anything more interesting to do.

As he had predicted already; her ship was on the middle of the crater, the ship’s access ramp already touching the dry ground of the crater, probably to let some air in. Orion 13 was too close to its sun for his comfort, and surely for hers as well. The mud on the sides of the ship and the numerous fallen leaves on its back made it appear like she had been stranded here for a couple days already; probably too proud to call for help.

When he walked down from his ship, one hand clutching his lightsaber and the other the old hammer, he felt down right ridiculous as he listened for any threat.

“Lieutenant?” he called, keeping his voice low enough so it wouldn’t alert whatever was threatening her outside of her ship.

The marks on the ground around her ship didn’t reassure him. It looked like the soil had been dug, turned over. Maybe she had been attacked.

The sight within her ship wasn’t much better. On various places, the walls looked like they had been clawed at, and several tools scattered on the ground looked like they had been chewed like a dog chews a bone. Lieutenant wasn’t in the cargo part of the ship. As Kylo went on, he heard a frustrated huff coming from the control room. On his guards, he softly stepped towards it, hesitating between igniting his weapon now or when he could see the threat. He had seen no trace of blood so far; a good thing.

When he rounded the corner and obtained full view on the control room, his lightsaber almost fell from his hands.

It was a complete mess. Papers were haphazardly strewn on the floor, as well as various pieces of metal he could identify as crooked metallic nails and tools apparently coming from a DIY box laying at the feet of a visibly very tired One-Ear.

“You’re here!” she marvelled in a rusty voice. “Good. I didn’t think you’d come. I wished you would though. I’m starving. This planet is way too organic for me.”

An easy come back would have been to tell her how he had almost gone back to sleep at the reception of her message, but something held him back from saying it.

Her skin was grey. Not the too-pale kind of grey, the tint one gets when one doesn’t step in the sun for a few months; no, the sickly, slightly necrotized kind of grey he remembered all-too well from having seen a couple times when he was younger.

Without a word, he offered her the hammer; her hungry eyes barely considering it for a second before she snatched it from him and took it to her mouth, her teeth scraping against its hard surface.

“You’re from the Luvilles system?” He guessed more than asked.

Her eyes darted to him as she kept chewing. Of course, he knew the answer already. Luvilles was a system in the early Outer Rim, which was known for its large mineral resources. Kylo had never been there personally; but in her time, _she_ used to talk about it a lot; especially when chewing on iron nails his uncle kept in reserves just for her. People from this system had a very high blood iron level, to the point where they needed to consume a lot of it to have a functioning bloodstream.

“I knew someone from Luvilles.” He quietly added.

To this, she shrugged, all the while gripping the hammer handle like her life depended on it; which was probably the case in a way.

“It’s a small world.” One-Ear offered humorously, her eyes already starting to get their usual brilliance back.

Trying to keep the painful memories at bay, Kylo tried not to show how her how her condition affected him. Out of all the systems in the entire Galaxy, it was curiously cruel that life would make him meet one of _her_ kind again.

“I guess it is.”

 

It took several months and countless encounters for the Commander of the First Order to finally find something in the calm mess that was Lieutenant’s head. A tiny fragment of her mind he passed by as he was exerting himself to dive in deeper, further in the shallows of her mind. All of a sudden, the Knight was overcome with this fleeting memory, long buried in the darkest parts of her head… half forgotten already.

The memory began in a flash of blue and red and the smell of burning flesh. A horrifying scream of agony resonated within his head; a plead that somehow felt familiar. Kylo Ren had heard many cries in his life, but of all of them, this one was the most peculiar. A wave of panic flooded his heart – or rather, that of the past One-Ear. This scream tasted of betrayals and suffering, though the sadness of it was what struck him the most.

Everything was black, and dark blue surrounding him. He couldn’t place One-Ear in the memory, blind to everything but the black and the blue, and the fragrance of blood and salt. Where he was wasn’t important, though, seeing as the woman was madly running, breath erratic as an indescribable pain made her flesh seethe.

She was running from something.

_A transaction gone wrong, I don’t know the details,_ had said the thin man who had introduced them to the other. Whatever it was she was running from was causing pure, raw panic to shoot through One-Ear’s veins. Panic; and a terrible ache in her heart.

Suddenly, Kylo felt the woman’s feet give up on her. Her body fell, crashing and rolling with a sound of clashing teeth. The memory ended as her body crashed violently against rocks, a taste of blood in her mouth.

“This was not a blaster wound.” The Commander breathlessly got out of the bootlegger’s head.

Next to him, One-Ear smirked. A poor smirk; one that didn’t reach her eyes, and barely lifted her lips. It felt like an automatic defence, like an answer that wasn’t quite one. In her eyes shone an icy light; fragile shield barely hiding a forgotten pain, as the fire of her hatred slowly melted it.

“No, Kylo Ren. It was not.”

 

_“I don’t understand.”_

_Gaze blurred by a mist of thoughts and void and her brows furrowed, One-Ear had the impression of being sat in front of one big puzzle, which was already made but that made no sense. Pieces that shouldn’t fit together were perfectly combined, when others seemed to have been put in their place randomly. The corner wasn’t even a corner, in this mess she was contemplating._

_“What are you thinking about, Lil’ Ear?”_

_The woman sighed and let herself rest her head against her partner’s shoulder._

_“The boy. The one who gave me the scar.”_

_Baron hummed in understanding, as he manoeuvred slowly their ship through a particularly tough asteroid belt. Their next transaction was situated on a very small planet, rarely indicated on maps, which had the particularity of having two asteroid belts revolving around it. Few places were safer for a not-that-legal exchange of possessions._

_However, this day, the scarred young woman couldn’t focus on the task at hand._

_“Oh, yeah, I remember him.” The smuggler nodded nonchalantly. “Was in tears most of the time I saw him, though. Couldn’t really imagine him doing anything nasty, but, as my mother used to say, ‘Never trust an ewok.’”_

_Her lips twitched._

_“Your mother was a sensible woman.”_

_“She was. What’s the matter with the boy? Has someone told you whatever he became?”_

_Lieutenant sighed again, and shook her head. This is what she got when her clients didn’t have enough credits or resources to pay –information. Maybe it was just a rumour, but she hardly saw how a Resistance sympathiser could spread such hearsay. It had to have some truth in it._

_“From what I heard, a Sith apprentice from the First Order massacred the Jedi camp… Years ago. Killed them all. Name’s Kylo Ren.”_

_Baron dared to look at her over his shoulder, as he flew around the last asteroid in the area. There was something melancholic in the way One-Ear gazed at the galaxy before them._

_“Well, if we ever cross his path, his drinks are on me.” He smirked to lift her mood._

_A similar smile formed on her lips, and though she still kept some form of emptiness in her eyes, she now dared to look directly at her partner._

_“I guess I had just always thought I would be the one to kill Ben Solo. I’m a bit disappointed, is all.”_


	5. Chapter 4

“I see you forwent the dress.”

The gracious way the woman gave him the finger answered Kylo’s first statement. He had been waiting for her in the cargo bay before going to the lavish party the First Order’s dignitaries had decided to throw. For once, it didn’t take place in the Finalizer; far too plain for the rich donators. Snoke wouldn’t be present; but he had insisted for his Commander to invite their new weapon supplier, to make it more official. Plus, if it could help them gain Baron’s trust, in the purpose of one day meeting directly with him, it would kill two pretty birds with one stone.

“I see you still wear that bucket on your head. The only difference between us is that I’m not disappointed.” She snickered, her hands tucked in the pockets of her bright red leather coat.

This was enough for Kylo to scoff and start walking, leading the way towards the reception hall. He honestly didn’t really know what he had expected. The master of the Knights of Ren had now known her for almost a year; and if he had sensed her softening towards him in the past months, he should’ve known by now that there was no changing her playful, taunting self.

As they passed several beautifully furnished halls, decorated with luxurious tapestries and candelabras, One-Ear seemed to marvel in the sight. From the corner of his eye, Kylo could see through the tough exterior she was trying her best to display. She looked like a little girl trying to hide how taken she was with the museum her parents took her to. Did she have parents? Had she known them? Had them raised her to become a bootlegger, or had she been an orphan before meeting Baron? All Kylo knew was that she was born in Luvilles and had begun her partnership with the man quite early in her life.

Kylo could still remember the time when he had been sympathetic to the arts and fanciness of such places. More than once, during the first months he had spent as Snoke’s apprentice, and at the first receptions he had been to, his eyes had found the beauty of such places. Now, after what felt like a lifetime spent in the First Order’s sober ships and impersonal grey corridors, even the most intricate patterns on the decorations felt dull.

As they entered the place of the reception itself, the Commander quickly found the mop of red, slicked hair that was General Hux’s head. Snoke had ordered him to introduce the trade lady to the man he loathed as soon as they arrived. The only joy it had brought Kylo was that of imagining the taunts and insults she would throw to the man. Just by thinking about it, he had become quite impatient to make the introductions.

“Follow me.” He smirked in his mask as he strode through the room to reach Hux.

Lieutenant rolled her eyes, but walked in his trail nonetheless.

“This is Armitage Hux, General of the First Order. Hux, here is the weapon supplier the Supreme Leader wanted you to meet.”

Ignoring the way the General’s Eyes bulged slightly at the sight of her face, One-Ear observed him from head to toe, before her lips curved slightly upwards, with a kind of discreet fondness in her eyes that Kylo immediately despised.

“I like your hair.” She simply said. “My brother had the same shade of red hair. Kissed by fire, as some say. You bet I was jealous.”

After a second of surprise, Hux smiled proudly, and shook the hand she offered.

_This was not the plan_.

“I’m sorry for your loss.” He empathised.

_As if Hux could empathise. Pretender_.

“Don’t be, really. I barely recall his face anymore. Just the prettiest hair.”

Blatantly ignored by both of his companions, Kylo resolved to just wait for them to stop their silliness. One-Ear was supposed to be here on business, not to have a good old _natter_ with the General of the First Order. A part of him, a very, very buried part of him was burning up in jealousy. Baron’s Lieutenant had hardly talked two words to him about her personal life in all the eleven months of their business. It just took Hux to be a redhead for her to open up on so many levels.

But he didn’t care. Of course he didn’t care what this stupid brat could tell this stupid arsehole… How could he be jealous when he could simply look into her mind?

“Would you like me to get you a drink?” the General offered, the slight smirk on his lips matching half of her own.

Something lit in the eyes of the trade lady, and she lifted her hand in the air in an exaggerated theatrical move.

“Of course. The most extravagant and lavish one you can find… Something fit for a lady such as myself.” She mocked all the beautiful women surrounding them.

With a chuckle, the General bowed slightly and left, leaving Lieutenant with a positively seething Kylo Ren. How come things never worked the way he intended them to? This snarky little bastard –as soon as the party ended, he would see.

His murderous thoughts were interrupted by a weary sigh coming from his companion.

“What a waste. This man was made for business. War will be his demise.”

This made him roll his eyes.

“Hux has been in the First Order for longer than I can remember, and so has his family. You wouldn’t want to say this to his face.”

One-Ear ignored his comment, lifting her eyes to admire the decorated ceiling for a moment. On the paintings, what seemed to be gods of a past time were dancing in the sky, shining above lands of grey flowers and red leaves.

“Mother War is a poor provider.” Lieutenant coolly stated. “She takes, and takes, and rarely ever gives. Fools are those who are lost in her embrace. All spends, no investments. In the end, only corpses and vultures.”

To this, Kylo snorted, a weird noise coming from his mask’s voice modulator. If she planned to be her usual jaded self all night, this “party” would sure be very long indeed. That One-Ear liked to taunt him was one thing he was used to by now; that she seemed to sympathise with his rival was another.

“And you, of course, are so much smarter for being one of said vultures?”

A throaty laugh left her lips, and for a second her eyes shined less harshly.

“Maybe.”

“And what, pray tell, makes you pity the poor General so much, when you don’t seem so worried about the Commander?”

Seemingly casually, the fighter crossed his arms –but nothing was ever casual with the Knight of Ren. Or rather, maybe he thought it was, but it hadn’t taken more than a few meetings and taunts for One-Ear to understand that it was not, really.

That she cared about it, however, was another thing entirely.

“I can’t worry about your being the commander of the First Order… not when I have seen what I have seen. There is a fire within you, darkling; a fire you put out with blood.”

This seemed to draw his attention, judging by the way he was stiffly standing. With the way his hands tensely clenched, the trade woman knew she had him hooked.

Lieutenant licked her lips, in a cat-like manner that irked Kylo. Her eyes, wide open, were giving her a mad look he was starting to get used to.

“The massacre of Ogrebois, five years ago. I was there on business. And, boy, you couldn’t have made a decent butcher if you tried. So much wasted meat…”

Memories of a red night, blood crackling under his lightsaber, and blaster shots tearing through flesh and stone flashed in his mind. Ogrebois had been one big mistake on a list of personal failures. Their target had escaped during the battle, and the numerous deaths of innocents had scared away more than one sympathizer. A rabid dog, he had been called then; it had taken him years of painful discipline from Snoke for him to break free from this image. On more than one night his tears had stained his sheets, his hands gripping the handle of his late childhood friend’s saber, sometimes taking it to his throat, thumbing the activation button. After nearly killing himself one fateful night, he had resigned himself to remove its kyber crystal. It had become too dangerous to comfort himself with a deathly weapon.

Kylo shook these thoughts from his head, furious that the bootlegger had such an influence on him. Who was she to remind him of past pains?

“Why do you seem to hate me so much, Lieutenant One-Ear? What have I done to you?”

Her eyes bulged out slightly, and she snickered, taking an unpleasantly sweet voice. As if to tell him a secret, she leaned in and whispered.

“I don’t hate you. I actually quite enjoy your company. But you stole something from me, Kylo Ren. You have no idea what, of course. It is no thing you can give me back. You stole what was mine, Ren, by right. And as much as the result is the same, it is a memory I was meant to own, and never will.”

Before he could investigate further, the General came back with what had to be the fanciest drink the Commander had ever seen. It was a deep purple beverage, which was taking an angry reddish colour at the top of the crystal glass, decorated with a couple of charms and fresh lemon slice.

“For the lady.” The General announced in a formal-flirty tone, which made a half-smile appear on her lips, a joyful gleam breaking the usual hardness of her gaze.

“This is so… outlandish and red. I love it!”

Her measured excitement annoyed Kylo incredibly, with him being still so unsatisfied that the redhead had interrupted their conversation. The two were now back to ignoring his presence, which irritated him even more, if possible.

As the General pointed to a First Order Lieutenant in the crowd and gave her his arm to cross the mass of guests in order to introduce her to her counterpart, Kylo closed his eyes and dived in the clear lake that was One-Ear’s mind; yet knowing he wouldn't find anything more than her usual mess of faded memories.

 

 

Later in the evening, as Kylo was watching the unremarkably grey ship start and fly away, the General surprisingly walked to stand next to him. A slight smirk was adorning his lips as he too watched the ship leave the cargo bay; seemingly deep in his insignificant thoughts.

“She’s got mean eyes, but she’s rather bright.”

And at this very second, the Commander felt his head spin.

 

_“Do you want to know a secret?” a young girl, not ten, asked as she played with him._

_Her gaze was feverish, her eyes circled in red, like they often were. Ben had been worried, the first time he had met her, that she would be sick; but Master Luke had explained to him that his was common for her people to have such allergies when young._

_“A secret?” Ben repeated, unsure of what to answer. “Are you sure you want to tell me?”_

_At this, the young girl only giggled and took his hand in hers._

_“Of course, silly. It’s not a big secret. I wouldn’t tell you big secrets.” She teased._

_The young boy smacked her on the back of her head, earning nothing but more giggles. He himself let out a chuckle, realising with a blush that he hadn’t let go of her hand. The little girl then leant towards him, and with a very serious face, whispered in his ear._

_“Do you know why they called me Meenah?”_

_Holding his breath at the perspective of keeping his very first secret, Ben shook his head. The girl’s feverish eyes twinkled._

_“Because I’ve got mean eyes. Get it?”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys!  
> It may be the first time I post a chapter on time. Champagne! This is actually one of the first chapters I wrote... look for the logic there! My drafts are one big mess.  
> Don't hesitate to give me your thoughts on how you like this fic so far, and have a nice day!


	6. Chapter 5

One-Ear whistled, as she was forcefully led through the corridors of what seemed to be a very big ship. Or a base. Probably both. A blindfold had been tightened around her eyes, depriving her of her sight, but the typical slight echo of her steps in narrow, windowless corridors gave her that much intelligence on the situation.

A pilot who had, obviously, recognized her from somewhere had intercepted her on a job. A black-skinned man, with a white scrawny girl.

In any other conditions, Baron’s Lieutenant may have been worried about where she was led to; however, her “guardians” had done a poor job of keeping info for themselves, and One-Ear was a hundred percent sure of where she was.

A Resistance base.

Now, the main reason why One-Ear was not particularly nervous about her fate was that, for one, she wasn’t clearly sided in the fight –nor did she want to be–, and second, that the main leader and General of the Resistance was none other than…

“General Leia Organa!” she exclaimed as she was propped down on a chair, her blindfold torn away from her eyes. “It’s been a long, long time.” she faked a smile and made a bit of a show, exposing her scarred cheek to the audience –the General, as well as who seemed to be a counsellor and the pilot.

She had been led to what seemed to be a meeting room of some sort, grey walls and white chairs.

In front of her stood a grey-haired woman with a sad look in her eyes. Time had been kind to her, though she could guess the weigh of the world pressing on her straight shoulders. One-Ear couldn’t exactly remember the last time she had seen her; only that she was there when she had woken up after the incident. Now that she looked at her, aged and solemn, she couldn’t help but be on edge facing this woman who looked so little yet so much like the young man she had sworn to hate.

The resistance fighter who had led her in came to stand just behind her, his hands on the backrest of the chair; making sure she wouldn’t get up. His presence was suffocating, and so was the silence before the storm.

Becoming more nervous with each passing second, One-Ear crossed her legs and offered them her most provocative smirk –her most trusted shield.

“Missed me?”

The grey lady, as she was used to nicknaming her, seemed to consider her words for a time, her eyes both awfully sad and resigned as she looked at what the younger woman had become. Such a sweet girl she had been, as a child. Always polite and humble; a good Jedi in the making. Leia had known, after the medical intervention and the damage done the girl’s face and brain, that there were few chances she wouldn’t suffer a trauma of some sort. Memory losses, aphasia, partial loss of sight, cognitive disorders, altered personality… There had been no way to know what would happen.

Not that it had mattered, eventually; in the General’s mind as well as any other’s at the time, Luke’s apprentice Meenah had died. Period. This conviction had gradually worn away with the years, replacing certitude by doubt and grief by confusion. It had been hard to handle for the Resistance leader; knowing that the girl’s body had never been found on the ship, yet being utterly convinced that she had passed… Having time altering this truth had taken a toll on her.

Eventually, the General prudently sat in front of One-Ear, careful in her every move as if a sudden gesture would make the trade lady run away, all the while eyeing the scars on the face of the woman she had known as a little girl.

“So you did survive after all.” She simply whispered, as in disbelief.

At this, Lieutenant snickered, not wanting to admit how upset she was getting by seeing this woman suddenly come back from what felt like a past life.

“Took you long enough to realize.” She bit, because biting was the only way she knew to deal with this insecurity, deep down in her heart. “I’ve been in business for years.”

The General shook her head, and somehow her gaze hardened, as if more resolute.

“Though I can’t help but be very touched to learn that my son’s–” One-Ear coughed violently at the mention of _him_ “–closest friend is still alive… It’s about this business of yours that I want to talk.”

One-Ear tilted her head. Of course. She knew she couldn’t be brought to see this General for such a trivial reason as family reunion. She had to have learned she was involved in a way with the First Order. Maybe they had recognised the craftsmanship of confiscated weapons –they were probably too similar to the few arms she had sold to the Resistance not to arise suspicion.

“You need to cease all contact with the First Order. We know you are supplying their weapons. Rumour has it you are in regular contact with their Commander… Kylo Ren. You need to understand that what they are doing is bad.”

The trade lady’s cool eyes met the General’s serious gaze. Words danced in One-Ear’s mind; words she couldn’t quite articulate together in any real answer. She couldn’t tell how little she cared about the horror of the First Order’s projects for the world, as long as her business was good. She couldn’t tell that –not to the woman who had taken her in when she was nothing more than a scrawny child; not to the woman who had tried to raise her into a decent human being and had failed by a dark twist of fate. A part of her, a very buried part of her, still held the grey lady in high respect; maybe even admired her a little. The frightened little girl she may have been once didn’t want to lie and didn’t want to offend.

However, time was rarely to honesty in this wretched world.

“There is no such thing as good or bad.” She eventually managed to state, the lie burning her mouth as she said it. “Only profit.”

She could see how her philosophy saddened the older woman. She could feel it in the way her eyes lost their light for a second, and how it came back with the shadow of a tear. One-Ear felt it, but her weak, treacherous heart couldn’t bring itself to be guilty.

The grey lady stayed silent for a while, before hanging her head down and taking a long inspiration.

“If it is the only way to make you see reason…” She muttered, before raising her eyes again to meet those of Lieutenant. “I know you probably don’t esteem my son as much as you used to…”

The trade lady scoffed, rolling her eyes. Euphemisms.

“That’s one way to put it. I’d rather say I would stab him as a greeting, and this on a good day, but, I guess your phrasing works too.”

General Organa gave her a pointed look.

“… Which is exactly why you should know this. The massacre at the Jedi camp, ten years ago… It was Ben. He joined the dark side this night… before taking the name of Kylo Ren.”

It didn’t take more than a second for One-Ear to react; suddenly turning to her right and throwing up on the floor of the meeting room, bile burning her throat. A tissue was handed her, which she used to wipe her mouth, not even noting who gave it to her; her mind a feverish mess.

“Wake up, Meenah. Kylo Ren is Ben. He has always been Ben.”

 

 

_Wake up, Meenah. Kylo Ren is Ben. You probably don’t esteem my son as much as you used to… So you did survive after all. He joined the dark side this night. Why do you seem to hate me so much? This was not a blaster wound. Meenah. Wake up. Kylo Ren is Ben. Why do I get the feeling I shouldn’t turn my back on you? Was in tears most of the time I saw him. He joined the dark side this night. So you did survive after all. Why do you seem to hate me so much?_

_Wake up, Meenah. This was not a blaster wound. Wake up. Wake–_

 

One-Ear opened her eyes. With a sigh, she shifted the arm that was circling her waist and sat up on the bed. Her thoughts were incredibly loud. Her encounter with the grey lady would not let her sleep. Sensing her agitation and frenzy to get out and skin Ren alive, the General had let her go, making sure the bootlegger was taken back to her ship. As soon as the words had left her mouth, she had known it was over; she had won. The scarred woman’s hate for Leia’s son would break the deal before the First Order knew what was going on.

What the leader of the Resistance didn’t know, what that a flame had been awoken in the darkest corner of One-Ear’s heart; an impatient flame, a sad beast walking in circles in its prison, occasionally pushing at her ribcage, desperately trying to get out.

With cold fingers, the scarred woman softly stroke her skin, where she supposed her heart was; trying to appease the beast before it tore its way out.

“What are you doing up?” the sleepy voice of her partner shook her out of her thoughts, and his hand, warm and reassuring, came to find her elbow. “You’re gonna catch a cold.”

The trade lady hummed in response, her eyes resting on the dark form of her lover in the white sheets. His eyelids were closed, but she could sense he was awake and waiting for her to come back to his arms. As the words escaped her, it felt like they finally brought peace to her mind; every contradictory thought in her head reaching an agreement.

“We’re killing Kylo Ren.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys !  
> I hope you're having a good day and that you liked this chapter. If you feel like giving your thoughts on how the story is progressing, feel free to leave a comment ! I don't bite ;)


	7. Chapter 6

When Kylo’s ship landed in the unfamiliar bay, it took him a moment to stabilize his tension. Apparently, his lieutenant’s presence at the First Order gathering the week prior had impressed Baron enough to personally invite the Commander on his main site of confection. And so, the Knight of Ren had made his way in secret for this faraway mining planet in the Dustig sector.

The reason for Kylo’s discretion about his trip was fairly simple and resided in a single name: Snoke. For now, the Supreme Leader hadn’t expressed any particular regard or annoyance at the bootlegger, and the Commander intended to keep it that way. If the Sith ever came to know what Kylo had realized not so long ago… He didn’t want to think about the consequences, but the chances that she would be alive at the end of the day were scarce.

A familiar middle-aged man welcomed him in the bay, all salt-and-pepper hair, sporting a short goatee. He could remember seeing him in many of One-Ear’s memories; he was the man he could find at the forefront of her mind most times. Still, he knew he could remember him from somewhere else. The Jedi camp. If the few days following the lightsaber incident were kind of a blur in his memory, he could now remember the face of the smuggler who had taken them to Leia’s ship. A sardonic man in his late thirties; he had gone back to Leia’s ship after dropping off Luke and Ben to the Jedi camp, so he could bring Meenah back too when she woke up. Surprisingly, things hadn’t gone the way they had planned.

“So here stands the great Kylo Ren!” Baron chuckled with no mean intention or hostility in his tone. “Lil’ Ear was waiting for you, but you know her, she’s not the kind to admit stuff like that. Want to visit the factory or to go straight to business and meet with my lady?”

If this was a disguised trap, the guest didn’t feel any form of jealousy coming from the man. The utter confidence in his steps as he led them away from the landing bay impressed Kylo. Without consulting the man’s thoughts, he could already tell how thoroughly he trusted his partner, and more than that, how he trusted himself. This felt almost foreign to him, who was so used to doubt, to being torn between light and darkness.

“Straight to business.” He answered humourlessly.

In any other circumstance, he might have been curious about their place of manufacture. But this day, he was pressed by time; with every passing second, he felt the need to talk to her grow. Kylo knew her to be unpredictable and could only guess her reaction, but somehow he couldn’t imagine keeping this knowledge to himself.

“As you wish.”

The walk through the base was cadenced by Baron’s light hum of a song Kylo had never heard before. The place looked to be bigger than he had thought. After a few turns and a few floors below, the older man stopped in front of an automated door.

“She’s there. She’ll take you to the weapons stock afterwards.”

Pushing his hand against the yellow light of the lock, he sent Kylo a side look. For the first time since they met a few minutes before, the man once aspired to be a Jedi felt something off coming from him.

The light turned to green, and Baron smiled as the door opened.

“I’ll leave you to her… _tender_ care.”

Now, Kylo could have investigated in his head what he meant by those words; but at the other end of the room, he could see her, and suddenly it didn’t matter anymore. She was seemed busy examining plans on a screen in front of her, standing with her back to him, seemingly unaware of his presence.

“Meenah…” he began, his voice wavering slightly as he saw her shoulders tense.

Seeing her back turned to him was unnerving, when all he had wanted for the past ten years was to see her face. The face he knew to be damaged, the face he barely knew anymore but was certain he would recognise now behind the missing ear and the cropped hair. Now that he knew –knew that it was her and no other, knew that somewhere beneath the skin and scars was beating the same heart he used to feel so close to his.

Slowly, as if approaching a wounded beast, Kylo made his way to her, watching her shoulders tremble slightly. From where he stood, he could already make out the burn mark on the left side of her face; and the thought that it was his own work slowly sank in. Memories from that night –memories he hadn’t known he had forgotten– flooded his mind; like a rusted lock had finally given in to the blows of what little remained of his younger self, somewhere deep at the back of his mind.

Somehow, he knew that similar images flicked beneath her eyelids.

Meenah was close. He could almost touch her.

One more step. His hand brushed her shoulders, begging her to turn around and face him.

When she did, a harrowing pain ripped through his side. Meenah had a mad look in her eyes, a mad smile on her lips, and a dirk firmly held in her bloodied hands.

“Hello, Ben.”

 

The blade was harshly pulled from his flesh, and Kylo felt the ground hit his knees. The sensation of blood seeping from his wound and staining his clothes felt almost foreign, as his vision started to blur, unable to focus on her.

The woman crouched in front of him; one of her hands clenching his shoulder as the other mercilessly dug the dirk into his stomach once more. A stray tear was staining her cheek, soon rolling onto her scars and into her mouth.

He did not think she noticed. Her face was distorted half in anger, half in anguish, and Kylo couldn’t tear his eyes off her. His trembling hands didn’t reach for his weapon, nor did they protest when it was torn from him and thrown across the room, or when the blade found his flesh another time. He did not cry, nor did he scream or say anything at all, too stunned that he was to finally be in front of her again. Her hands on him, her burning hatred licking his pained aura, her forceful shove of the blade in his guts, were making this reunion very real. For him who had fantasized such a moment throughout all these years, it remained a precious instant no matter the circumstances or the fact that she seemed resolved on slaughtering him in the roughest manner. None of it mattered; he was kneeling in front of this friend he had so brutally murdered so long ago, their foreheads almost touching.

“I’m sorry.” He managed to croak, though he could have cried in the desert, for no answer came.

One of her hands circled his neck lazily, before coming to grip the back of his mask, feeling around for a way to take it off of him, eventually getting irritated and ripping it off his face. The man did nothing to stop her, only groaning in discomfort when the tight latches scratched his ears and chin, the harsh exposure somehow more cruel than the deep wounds in his chest. Her hand fisted his hair, pulling it to make him look up at her. When he did, a stray fascination was dancing amidst the hatred in her eyes.

“I knew I couldn’t have waited all these years...” She licked her lips. “Despised the memory of your face… Spat on your name… All for nothing.”

She pulled the blade from him once again, slowly, smiling as he panted and closed his eyes. This was too good to be true, he guessed, of course she would thrive on the power she had over him.

“I lost faith in destiny the day I heard you had died. It felt like a dessert devoid of taste. Something pretty to contemplate, yet terribly unexciting.”

The edge of the sword trailed from his chest to his neck, teasing the tender skin there without for all that drawing any more blood. The tip of the dirk then danced on his cheeks, around his eyes, and for the life of him, he couldn’t muster the force to move away, or maybe catch her wrist, shove her away, anything. His hands laid unmoving on his thighs, fingers trembling, aching to stop her, though he found himself incapable of doing so.

“And here I am…” his voice felt raspy and dry, raw with emotion.

Maybe it was the pain catching up to him, the white searing pain that was making him so light-headed. Maybe it was the threatening blade, tracing light patterns on his neck. Or maybe it was the growing realization that Meenah may really be gone. How astray can a soul be led before it breaks? His sweet, honest friend… He could see now how her face had aged, the innocent sparkle in her eyes gone and replaced by guarded tension, her hair cropped, her skin burnt beyond repair. A tear fell down his cheek, and her eyes followed its trail to his chin curiously.

“And here you are.” She hummed. “Letting yourself get beaten up like a ragdoll. Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing. You’re making it easy to kill you because you can’t live with it anymore. You can’t live with me… being my gruesome self… all because of you.” She smirked, and somehow her words rang true in a small, hateful part of his mind.

His trembling, useless hands managed to reach her shoulders as she eyed them warily; yet knowing his strength was leaving him. One of his hands trailed up to rest on her neck while the other hesitantly came to cup her hollow cheek.

“I think you’re beautiful.” He coughed, letting blood run past his lips and onto his chin. “You always were.”

One of her hands was still clutching the dirk. With the other, she batted his from her. She could see him weakening from his feverish complexion and the shaking of his hands. The end was nigh. Soon, he would die and she would be happy; yet the thought of him dying on her right now felt incredibly tasteless. He had come to her probably knowing of his fate and had done nothing to prevent it. Now where was the fun in killing a man who was seeking death, or at the very least welcoming it in this manner?

Bloody bastard; managing to make his own death –which she had dearly wished for all these years– unsatisfactory. No; he wouldn’t get to steal her moment.

“Lies!” She spat at him. “Damn you, Ben Solo! Making it so fucking boring. Couldn’t you have run? Slashed me open with that light blade of yours? Choked me with your almighty Force? You _coward_!” She screamed the insult.

By then, tears were running freely on her face, and she couldn’t comprehend why. This was her moment; the one she had aspired to ever since taking off these awful bandages, ever since the painkillers had worn off, leaving her with a bitter taste in the mouth and a ghostly pain in what was left of her heart. The moment she had imagined a thousand times, the moment she had spent hours telling her lover about as they were getting off to thoughts of future plans, imagining the details of her blade on his skin, of the blood oozing on her fingers, of his ashen face once it would be done.

This was the most beautiful day of her life. Why was she crying?

The blade trembled in her hands, before falling to the ground.

“You were always the best of us two.” He laughed quietly.

Meenah shook her head, trying to put her thoughts straight. He was talking about times she barely recalled anymore; only a vague notion of a beach, and burning pain, and white noise filling her thoughts as he referred to their childhood. Only that, and the image of his face; a blue light colouring his skin in the night and his eyes darkened in an uncontrolled anger, as he lifted his weapon to give the final blow.

“Shut up.” She ordered him, but he wasn’t having any of it.

His hands found her cheeks again. His dark eyes were a shade lighter than she remembered. It didn’t matter. _Kylo Ren is Ben. He has always been Ben_. The grey lady was right. He had been Ben Solo pretending to be Kylo Ren. She could see it now.

“You weren’t the strongest with the Force, but certainly the most skilled. I used to be envious, Master Luke was so proud of you.”

Somehow, his deep voice had her entranced, and so Meenah closed her eyes, willing the emotions he was sharing with her to disappear.

“Shut up or I will carve your heart out.” She muttered.

His thumb stroked her cheekbone, as if he was the one calming her agonizing self. This was too much. Her eyes snapped open and she bit his fingers; drawing blood and an amused –though pained– huff from him.

“Still, I would have never hurt you.” He went on softly, as though sleepily as unconsciousness claimed him; and though all of her being knew he was lying, she still felt doubt creep up her chest.

Her hands shot to his neck and she pushed him to the ground, sat on his wounded chest, and compressed his throat will all of her strength.

“I told you to shut the fuck up!” She roared, tears pricking at her eyes but she couldn’t afford to wipe them.

She could feel his blood pumping under her hands, and willed herself to tighten her hold. By the end of this day, nothing would remain of Ben Solo but a sad corpse.

His lips moved, and she blinked back a few tears to get a clearer view of his –probably last– words.

“I’ll be waiting for you in Hell.” He mouthed at her. _Come find me_ , he meant.

And so Kylo Ren closed his eyes, never to be opened again.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... First of all, as usual, I'm sorry for the lateness.  
> Here was the last chapter of OMAWR, though I will be posting an epilogue, mh, "soon".  
> I hope you liked it, don't hesitate to give me your thoughts on how the story unfolded.


	8. Bridge

_For what felt like eternity, One-Ear watched the body laying on the ground, taking in the marks around its neck and the blood gently oozing, as well as its pale complexion as Death claimed its due. She could still feel the ghostly presence of his hands on her skin, the surprising warmth of his palms on her cheeks, a feeling that brought back obscure memories of her youth. Even now as she was contemplating his unmoving body, a strange fondness was overcoming her at the sight of his face._

_A clap of hands shook her from her thoughts, as the loud steps of her lover made their way towards her. When she looked up, she was met with the smirking face of a Baron._

_“That’s a job nicely done, love.”_

_Before her lack of answer, the man embraced her from behind, lightly kissing her shoulder. His hands came to rest on her belly, in a tender manner that made her shiver with some twisted form of relief, her tensed muscles relaxing all of a sudden, leaving her unsure of her ability to stand on her own feet._

_“So, for the body, I thought of a couple things…” He whispered contentedly in her ear. “There are the Maeser IV cannibals, who would be delighted to relieve us of this… burden… Or the graveravers from Rimmer III… A bit more cheap, but they always invite us for barbecue afterwards.” He chuckled._

_The words simmered in her belly, scorched her throat as they went up, and felt bitter on her tongue when they came out._

_“He’s not dead yet. He’s tough. Still fighting. He was always good at fighting.”_

_Baron hummed in response, if anything a bit surprised at the trembling in her voice. He knew just how much this day meant to his protégée, and though seeing her so upset over the dying man was quite unexpected, he guessed he could have foreseen it._

_“Do you want me to finish him off?”_

_Blood came to lick at her boots and One-Ear took a deep, shaky breath. With each passing second, she could feel the man on the ground a bit closer to death and a bit further from life; the thin thread of his life was resting in her hands, for her to cut or to leave._

_“No.” She exhaled._

_The breath down her neck made her close her eyes, as she only focused on its calming effect._

_“Then do it. What are you waiting for?” his lips trailed softly under her wounded ear, his nose nudging its pointy remains._

_Listening to her quiet heartbeat, she couldn’t feel the beast within her ribcage anymore; sated, it had gone back to sleep in the quietest part of her heart. It would be so easy to finish the poor life of this wretched soul. A single slit on his throat; anything quicker than letting time and blood loss claim his life._

_However, a funny thought crossed her mind, and she let out a breathy laugh as she realized its truthfulness._

_“I can’t.”_

_Saying it aloud made a shiver run down her spine, and she softly left her lover’s arms to crouch next to her childhood friend and enemy of a lifetime. Her hand came to brush over his forehead. A few strands of hair were covering his face. She pushed them aside, to have a better view of his traits._

_“It is what I wanted… what I needed.”_

_He had aged well, though he hid it under a thick metal mask. The ghost of the young girl she had been, the one weeping at the back of her mind, could still remember the softness of his lips on her cheek. It was a curious feeling; never had she recovered any sweet memory of their friendship before._

_“I thought I could do it. Now I can’t.”_

_Shaking her head, she got up again. A few feet from her, the bloodied dirk was taunting her; but it was over. The wave of her rage had receded. Later, when she would remember this moment, she would feel some kind of shame at how feral she had been; in no way better than how the animal laying on the floor had hurt her in the first place._

_But at this moment, she no longer felt anything but exhaustion._

_“Mend his wounds. I know of someone who would pay a fair price to have him alive.”_


	9. Epilogue

Ben Solo gazed at the galaxy through his window; all the while mindlessly thumbing the rugged skin of the scars on his chest. Three thin slits –that used to be three deep holes. The blade had rather miraculously avoided his heart, though it had punctured one of his lungs. In his dreams, the memory was somewhat still fresh; just thinking about it brought a phantom throb of pain just under his skin, the burning of infection often at the back of his mind.

It had been the same ever since he had woken up, bandaged and sore, the light too bright for his eyes accustomed to the darkness of the Finalizer.

The weeks of remission had been filled with pain and doubt. However, past the initial shock and angered mortification of having been sold like a piece of meat, like a beast like any other… He had been surprised to find no rancor whatsoever in his heart; as if the blade had sucked in hatred and anger, and had torn them from him. Some time after his remission, and despite a now faint, raspy voice screaming at the back of his mind, Ben had sat next to his mother and meditated. One may question how such a simple act could bring tears to her eyes and peace to his mind; but deep down, he had known then he had been running away from it for too long a time. And though he knew he would likely never experience the Light in its purest form, like his mother did, for the first time in years, he had felt like he could find balance.

Eventually, his mother came around sending him on missions with this Poe pilot she admired as her second son. The one who was there, when he was not; but no jealousy rested in his heart. He wouldn’t have felt legitimate for that.

Sometimes, when he watched the sky while on a faraway planet, on some risky infiltration, he would see a grey, unremarkable ship leaving the grounds or flying over them. And every time, he would follow its course in the sky until it was out of sight, wondering if by the hazards of life, or because the world _was_ so small, it had been _her_ he had somehow seen flying away.

The last time he had ever seen her, blade had cut through flesh and memory alike.

With months and her silence, guilt would eventually fade away in the deepest part of his heart, where past history remained until nothingness claimed it. So would the memory of her face, that he kept looking for in the crowds among which he walked; a red pride now woven on his shoulder, where black and red had sat for the past decade.

With time, Ben would learn to accept that Meenah was gone.

Not that it really mattered, in the end.

After all, so was Kylo Ren.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is the epilogue, as promised.  
> I am incredibly happy and even more relieved that this story is finally finished!  
> I may rewrite it at some point, because I'm not going to lie to myself, it still is rather messy and badly written on some parts. 
> 
> Still, I am rather satisfied with what it became. Originally, OMAWR was only supposed to be a one shot (Of trust and deadly light) but I fell in love with Baron. I know, he doesn't even really appear in OMAWR, but I love him nonetheless.  
> This is how I figured I wanted Meenah to still be alive, because it formed a dynamic I liked. Both of them thinking the other is dead, one regretting his act and the other wanting to kill their former friend... Kylo hiding his face behind a mask, alone and with a heavy heart; One-Ear showing off her scars for the world to see, the most beautiful woman in her lover's eye... Ben killing Meenah and One-Ear killing Kylo...  
> It's contradictory and I like that. 
> 
> Anyway, this note is already long enough ! As always, feedback is welcome.  
> For the last time on this story,  
> Have a nice day you all.


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